Gators Headline

Wednesday February 19, 2014Will You Have the SEC Network? Start Asking That Question Now

GAINESVILLE,
Fla.
-- The calendar says it’s only March, but National Signing Day has come and
gone. Before we know it, spring practice will be here, followed by the Orange
& Blue Debut game. After that, the countdown to the 2014 college football season
will commence.

Will
you have the SEC Network?

The
Southeastern Conference and its member institutions are encouraging their
passionate fans to start asking the question now.

ESPN
is actively negotiating with cable companies and satellite providers across the
country in an effort for them to make the SEC Network part of its basic
packages.

Due
to launch in August, the 24-hour SEC Network will air more than 1,000 live
events during the 2014-15 athletic year, including
45-plus football games, 100 men’s basketball games, 75 baseball games, 60
women’s basketball games and 50 softball games.

To
be clear, these will be games that will not air on CBS, ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU or
any of the other sister networks to the league. Viewers without the SEC Network
will not have access to these games in their home or wireless devices.

“More
than anything else, we don’t want people to be surprised when August rolls
around,” explained Mike Hill, University of Florida executive associate
athletic director for external affairs. “You can understand how the casual fan,
even the serious fan, might think, ‘OK, we’re just talking about, say,
Florida-Charleston Southern or Georgia-Wofford or Alabama-Georgia State.’ That
is not going to be the case. We’re talking about some really big conference
games that a lot of people will be talking about and people are going to want
to see.”

Case
in point: Texas A&M at South Carolina.

That’ll
be the SEC Network’s debut game, set for Aug. 28 -- a Thursday night -- and if
your cable company or satellite provider isn’t carrying SEC Network you’re
going to be heading for a sports bar or waiting for highlights on SportsCenter later that night.

The
blitz is on to make SEC fans understand how this brave new conference channel
world is going to work.

“There’s
a bit of a misunderstanding that this is a pay-per-view network,” Hill said.
“This is a channel like ESPN or ESPN2 or ESPNU that is being marketed to the
cable operators to carry as another channel in their basic cable lineup. That’s
the goal. So this is not something that fans would have to pay a premium
for.”

Translation:
The SEC Network will be like the Cartoon Channel or Food Network or Turner
Classic Movies, for example. It’ll be up to the provider to pick it up and
include in the packages offered to customers.

The
choice will be up to the providers, but the SEC has set up an avenue to inquire
about the pending availability of the network.

The
above “Get SEC Network” website allows fans to punch in their zip codes and see
whether their providers plan on carrying the channel or begin lobbying them to
do so.

Follow
@SECNetwork on Twitter for updates as the Aug. 21
launch draws near.

“It
may seem like it’s early, but negotiations will heat
up significantly in the next month or two between ESPN and cable operators and
satellite operators,” Hill said. “The fans have been given an avenue here to
let their voices be heard. The idea is that the SEC fan base is as strong and
vociferous as any in the country and will let it be known this network is
important to them.”